


Bleed Just To Know You're Alive

by vix_spes



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Gen, Suicidal Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-06-22
Updated: 2009-06-22
Packaged: 2018-01-11 07:55:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1170590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vix_spes/pseuds/vix_spes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A look at Severus Snape's thoughts following his graduation and how he came to accept a teaching post at Hogwarts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bleed Just To Know You're Alive

Severus Snape sighed as he stumbled downstairs to the basement of Snape Manor where the potions laboratory was situated. His father was away at the Ministry for several days on business, staying in the Snape town-house rather than returning to the Manor each night. By contrast, his mother was away for the summer travelling on the continent with several of her friends. Making his way into the lab he headed for a cupboard that was warded heavily and charmed to only open to his magical signature. The door swung open to reveal a single vial of a jet black potion. The potion wasn’t commercially available, nor was there a recipe for it in any potions journal, textbook or amongst the best of potions masters.  
  
  
Severus had created the potion himself three years earlier, when a decision had been taken out of his own hands, and his father had put him through the worst kind of hell. His life had never been a picnic, or anything resembling what a childhood should be, and his schooldays, the days that people are told are supposed to be the best of your life had been made thoroughly miserable simply due to a quartet of his peers, better known as the Marauders. These four boys; James Potter, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin and Peter Pettigrew had made his life hell simply for the fact that he was both a Slytherin and somewhat of a loner. The utter misery of his life at Hogwarts had been compounded one day after he had completed his OWLS when he had been turned upside down and subsequently exposing himself to the surrounding audience, all courtesy of the Marauders. That had also been the day when he had lost his only true childhood friend – Lily Evans when he had called her a mudblood. His friendship with Lily had been the best thing in his life, and when he was with her he’d always felt that it was the closest to heaven that he’d ever get, that he would give up forever just to be with her. But she’d never known that he loved her, she was too enamoured with James bloody Potter.  
  
That summer, his sixteenth, his life had gone further downhill once he had returned to Snape Manor for the holidays. His father had taken him to be initiated as a Death Eater, becoming a servant of the Dark Lord Voldemort. Severus’ father, Tiberius, had been a disciple of Tom Riddle, as Voldemort was previously known, since he had started his bid for power and over the years they had grown in their love and use of the dark and twisted Dark Arts. Severus had been initiated to become the Dark Lord’s potions master and Severus hated the fact that his talents were now reduced to creating potions that were used to maim and torture men, women and children of all ages. It was never what he had wanted to be known for.  
  
With a shaking hand, Severus reached out and grasped the black vial. As he did so his sleeve drew up, revealing an ugly black tattoo that was surrounded by a spider web of thin white scars revealing a history of self-mutilation, an attempt to make himself feel something, make himself bleed in order to feel alive and attempt to repent what he has done through the letting of his own blood. Slowly, he walked out of the dungeons and upstairs to his fathers study. He found it rather fitting that his father would find him, dead, in the room where he had been most punished throughout his life. What he was not expecting when he walked into the room was to be greeted by the Headmaster of Hogwarts, Albus Dumbledore himself. He stopped still in the door and had it not been for his immense self-control he would have dropped the all important vial. Instead he just stood and stared at the man  
  
“Professor Dumbledore. What are you doing here?”  
  
“Severus, I was just merely paying a visit. It was quiet at the castle and I felt the need to come here. Where are your parents? Are they not here?”  
  
“You know perfectly well they’re not here Headmaster. If my father had been here you would never have gained entry to the manor. Why did you feel the need to visit? I graduated from Hogwarts a year ago. As far as I’m aware you’ve never paid visits to Hogwarts graduates before so why now and why me.”  
  
A sad look crossed Albus’ face as he moved to sit down “You are right of course, I have never paid visits to Hogwarts graduates before but you are different. I never realised how much I truly failed you whilst you were a student at Hogwarts. I should have reined in certain students and been much more just in both my punishment of them and my treatment of you. I have the feeling that I have played an instrumental role in the road you have travelled.”  
  
Severus sighed deeply “Headmaster, you are not responsible for my actions. I am not responsible for my actions. I have had no choice in my life since I was sixteen – my life is completely dictated by my father and unless he dies then I will have no choice in my life for the foreseeable future.”  
  
Albus’ face twisted in either grief or remorse, Severus wasn’t sure which, “So it is true then. Your father forced you to take the Dark Mark. I had heard it but I was hoping it wasn’t true.”  
  
Severus smiled bitterly “My father forced me to take the Dark Mark when I was sixteen Headmaster. I was initiated into the Death Eaters in order to become the Dark Lord’s potions master. The potions I have been forced to create have been used to torture, maim and kill men, women and children of all ages and I hate myself for it. Even more, I hate my father for making me go through it and I hate my mother for being so weak as to submit to my father.”  
  
Albus slowly but surely moved over to the skittish teenager who was cowering close to the door and, reaching out his hand he slowly but surely drew up the left sleeve on the threadbare robes revealing the ugly black tattoo surrounded by the web of pale white scars revealing just how much Severus hated himself. “Oh child, what have you been subjected to?” The blue eyes were bright with sympathy.  
  
Severus looked like he was expecting recriminations rather than sympathy and seemed to relax slightly “Sir?”  
  
Albus shook himself before he spoke again “I’m fairly sure that there is no good reason for that potions vial in your hand Severus and I’m here to inform you that it is unnecessary. I’m here to offer you sanctuary. You have far too much left to do to be leaving this world yet and I refuse to let you kill yourself. If you would like it, I am in desperate need of a teacher at Hogwarts and I’m here to offer the position to you.”  
  
“To me? Sir?”  
  
“Hogwarts has always prided itself on having the best as its teachers, true masters at their subjects. In that respect, I am asking you to take up the position as Potions Master at Hogwarts. I can think of no-one better for the job. You would be paid a reasonable salary and of course all of your board and lodgings is taken care of as you will live in the castle. Well, my boy, what do you say?”  
  
“Erm… I don’t really know what to say Headmaster”  
  
“Say yes my dear boy. I have to admit that the offer is mutually beneficial as we would gain a much needed and highly talented potions master whilst you would have the advantage and protection of the wards surrounding the castle that would keep you safe from that creature that sired you.”  
  
“In that case Headmaster, I would love to work for you.”  
  
Albus smiled and held out his arms, “That’s wonderful news my boy. Welcome to the staff of Hogwarts.”  
  
The vial shattered as it hit the flagstones of the study, sending black liquid cascading over the stones, part of the desk and over Severus’ and the headmasters boots. In a similar manner Severus crumpled into the headmaster as the mans kind words broke through his shell. For his first five years at Hogwarts he had considered the older man to be the kind of father he had always wished to have. That thought changed when, in his sixth year, the headmaster failed to punish three of the Marauders for their part in a plot that, had it worked, would have seen Severus killed or mauled at the very least by a werewolf. Since that event, Severus had tried to hide himself from the world thinking that none of them would understand him, or the way that he thought. But now, sheltered in the headmaster’s embrace, he thought that he had finally found someone who knew who he was, that he no longer had to bleed just to feel alive. And, as the darkness of Snape Manor faded and became the welcoming warmth of the Hogwarts castle, he realised that this was the closest to heaven that he’d ever be and he didn’t have to worry about going home, because this was his home now.

**Author's Note:**

> If you would prefer to comment on LJ, you can do so [here](http://vix-spes.livejournal.com/15806.html)


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